Press Release

New Trend in Franchising Introduced in Upcoming Franchise Show

Binalot Fiesta Foods introduces the Company Supervision Scheme for franchisees who are either absentee owners (such as OFWs) or are too busy to manage full-time their franchised stores.

Paranaque City, Philippines, September 26, 2011 --(PR.com)-- A new trend in the franchising industry will soon be introduced by Binalot Fiesta Foods during the forthcoming Franchise Asia 2011. Binalot will introduce the Company Supervision Scheme (CSS), an initiative that is expected to revolutionize the way the franchising industry will be managed and promoted.

Rommel T. Juan, President of Binalot, says that while the traditional tenets of franchising require that a franchisee be a hands-on, full-time manager, they realized that in today’s fast-paced, multi-tasking world, this might be too much to ask of a franchisee. “There are simply too many pressures and stresses in today’s world that demand too much of the franchisee’s time. This is where the Company Supervision Scheme comes in. Binalot will assign its own supervisor for the store and effectively ‘manage’ the store for the franchisee,” he said.

He added that Binalot first came up with this scheme when one franchisee became too busy with other businesses and concerns that she became too busy to manage her store and consequently, sales dropped. “Binalot helped with management and the result was very good. Sales came back up and the store got back on its feet. We then started to offer the service to other franchisees who cannot commit the required time to manage the store. The list of those availing of this scheme is growing and we are optimistic about its future.”

Binalot has a reason to be optimistic about the future of franchising in the Philippines. Philippine Franchise Association (PFA) President Elizabeth Pardo-Orbeta says that a solid proof of the strength of domestic franchising is today’s 1,100 concepts and brands that have multiplied into 115,000 outlets. “This roughly represents a 10 percent growth between 2008 and 2010. The favorable business climate and environment makes our country the best gateway of the world to the 600 million Southeast Asian market,” Orbeta says.

She adds that even more astounding are the figures achieved by the domestic franchising sector. “The number of Filipino franchisees grew by a mind-boggling 307 percent while franchisors increased by 83 percent. It currently employs about one million individuals and accounted for US$ 9.45 billion or 30 percent of last year’s retail output.”

“We expect the country’s franchising sector to further grow by 20 percent in the next two years due to the entry of new players from micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs), the continued rise of the business process outsourcing (BPO) industry, and introduction of indigenous and food concepts,” Orbeta explains.

Juan revealed that with the initial success of the CSS, Binalot is contemplating on offering it to OFWs so that they can invest in a Binalot franchising business even if they are still abroad. “A lot of times, OFWs just send money back to their relatives to invest but when they come back, it’s all gone. It is because the business was left in the hands of an inexperienced relative. With our CSS, they are more confident that their hard-earned money will not go down the drain.”

He points out that their own study has shown that most OFWs really want to get into a small-scale business as a safety net. “They would normally go into the traditional sari-sari store, carinderia, taxi, jeepney, tricycle or shuttle business. We are able to convince them that franchising has a much higher success rate which is just perfect for an absentee owner. The problem is that sometimes a relative is tasked to manage the OFW’s store and it is unsuccessful because the relative is not really inclined to business. Sometimes, he is even resentful that he now has to work while before he just got the monthly dole out.”

Juan explains that in Binalot’s CSS, the relative still manages the business’ bank account but the Binalot head office handles the day-to-day operations. “This scheme is expected to make the OFW franchisee more confident that the safety net is really there when the time comes. And Binalot’s CSS will ensure that it is really there for him.”